Top Takeaways From the 2024 SOCi Local Visibility Index (LVI)

Discover the Untapped Potential in Localized Marketing

Today, consumers are searching locally for businesses. Our Consumer Behavior Index (CBI) research found that 8 in 10 U.S. consumers search for local businesses weekly, and 32% do so daily.

But how do you ensure you appear at the top of search results? And how can you guarantee consumers are impressed when coming across your local business pages?

With our sixth annual SOCi Local Visibility Index (LVI) report, we’ve done the research for you. We analyzed nearly 3,000 multi-location businesses and applied more than 100 metrics to each location.

We found that multi-location brands stand to miss out on a staggering $126 million each, collectively translating to $54.1 billion across the U.S., by not maximizing their local marketing strategy.

This blog post summarizes the top takeaways from our 2024 LVI research report, “The 100 Most Visible Local Brands: Who’s Winning, Who’s Struggling, and Why” and shows you how to effectively capture your local audiences. 

What Is the SOCi Local Visibility Index (LVI)?

The SOCi Local Visibility Index (LVI) is a comprehensive benchmark measuring multi-location brands’ online visibility across key digital channels. This year marks the sixth anniversary of the SOCi LVI, and we’ve expanded its scope to include nearly 2.8 million store and office locations from approximately 2,791 multi-location companies — 4X the number of companies ever included in the SOCi  LVI.

Unlike previous years, the 2024 SOCi LVI provides a more detailed analysis by incorporating more data points and advanced AI data analysis. However, the focus remains on the three critical areas of localized marketing:

• Search: Visibility on the platforms consumers use to seek information about local businesses.
• Social: Presence in local markets on social platforms and ability to build and engage with local audiences.
• Reputation: Consumer ratings and reviews, and brands’ responses to local consumer feedback.

Our SOCi LVI looks at overall online visibility, local rankings, star ratings, review responses, on-page and off-page SEO, and local engagement. We weighted and scored all these factors to produce two results for every business:

1. Optimization Score: This measures the extent to which a business implements all tactical optimizations that drive local visibility and performance.
2. Performance Score: This judges how highly ranked and rated a business is and how successfully it engages local audiences.

High Visibility Brands Vs. Average Brands

Our SOCi LVI optimization and performance scores determine how well brands perform in localized marketing. It’s important to note that high visibility doesn’t necessarily equate to national brand recognition. Instead, it reflects how well top companies compete and appear for non-branded searches like “pet store near me.”

Revenue Implications

Strong visibility leads to higher consumer trust, better engagement, and ultimately increased revenue.

High local online visibility translates directly to local dollars. SOCi research shows that the most visible brands in the SOCi LVI grow revenue at 2-3X the rate of the average company year over year.

Furthermore, previous SOCi research found that Google Business Profiles (GBPs) in the 3-pack or Local Pack receive 126% more traffic and 93% more actions (calls, website clicks, and driving directions) than businesses ranked 4-10.

Key Differences Between High Visibility Brands and Average Multi-Location Businesses

As noted above, high visibility brands not only dominate local search results but also achieve significantly higher YoY revenue compared to average multi-location businesses.

Here’s a breakdown of the significant localized marketing differences between high visibility brands and the average multi-location business:

Google Search Results:

• High visibility brands appear on page one in local search results 53.2% of the time, compared to just 23.6% for the average company.
• Top brands are 2.3X more likely to be seen by consumers searching for local businesses online.

Responsiveness to Consumer Feedback:

• High visibility brands average 4.5 out of 5 stars on Google.
• They respond to 80.5% of their reviews with an average response time of 2.1 days, whereas average brands respond at a 45.1% rate and take 6 days — nearly 3X longer!

Local Audience Engagement on Social:

• High visibility brands have 3.6X as many Facebook followers on local social pages than the average brand.
• These top brands post 15.3 times monthly, nearly twice as much as the average brand (7.9).
• High visibility brands post video content 21.5% of the time compared to the average brand’s 10.5%.

These statistics reveal the stark difference in localized marketing between high visibility brands compared to the benchmark multi-location brand.

The differences are even more astonishing for low visibility brands. For instance, companies in the low visibility quadrant only appear on page one of Google’s local search results 4% of the time. Plus, they respond to only 10.9% of their Google reviews and take 12 days to do so.

See the SOCi LVI data for more stark differences between high visibility, average, and low visibility companies!

2024 SOCi LVI Benchmarks

This year’s benchmarks provide more comprehensive data since we analyzed more brands. The expanded scope allows us to offer more accurate and actionable insights.

Across most SOCi LVI metrics, the 2024 benchmarks are lower than those of 2023 due to the increased number of businesses analyzed, which led to more low  visibility brands.

Here are some important averages we found from the three areas of localized marketing.

Search Benchmarks

• 97.8% of GBPs are claimed, much higher than Yelp (81.3% found compared to Google) and Facebook (62.5% found compared to Google).
• Profile completeness is highest on Google (92.1%), followed by Facebook (90.6%), and then Yelp (82.1%)

Reputation Benchmarks

• Individual businesses average far more reviews on Google (111.5) than on Facebook (11.5) and Yelp (9.6).
• Businesses also respond much more often to Google reviews (45.1%) than to (4.5%) and Facebook (0.4%). 
• Surprisingly, companies respond to reviews on Facebook fastest (2.9 days), followed by Yelp (5.4 days) and then Google (6.0 days). Perhaps this is because there are fewer reviews on Facebook and Yelp than on Google, making it easier to respond. 

Social Benchmarks

• Multi-location businesses make a reasonable effort to share content with local audiences, posting an average of 7.9X monthly on Facebook. There’s room for improvement on Google, where companies only post 0.10X per month.
• On Facebook, there’s a strong mixture of photo (75.6%) and video content (10.5%). However, the engagement rate is low at 0.53%.

Note that these averages vary greatly by industry. For industry breakdowns and more benchmark data, see the full SOCi LVI data set!

Start Improving Your Local Visibility With the Help of SOCi

Local visibility remains the most significant overlooked opportunity for brick-and-mortar businesses, which is why this research matters. Clearly, there’s a stark difference in organic search rankings, customer retention, and sales when comparing high visibility brands to average and low performers.

What’s also apparent is the vast number of localized marketing tactics and levers you need to pull to be a highly visible and top-performing multi-location business.

SOCi is here to help!

SOCi’s CoMarketing Cloud connects all major networks with your business locations, enabling seamless communication, unified data, and AI-driven local marketing decisions.

Genius AI is the brain behind our CoMarketing Cloud, analyzing location data to recommend high-impact tasks and automate your local marketing at scale!

Currently, SOCi offers three AI-powered products designed to enhance all aspects of localized marketing:

1. Genius Search: Simplifies SEO, provides localized recommendations, and continuously optimizes listings to increase local search visibility.
2. Genius Social: Automates social media management, creating hyper-localized content and optimizing consumer interactions and responses.
3. Genius Reputation: Manages online reviews and ratings, ensuring timely, on-brand, and location-specific responses to customer feedback.

These products communicate and interact with one another to execute the best local marketing strategy possible for each individual store or office.

So, why choose SOCi’s CoMarketing Cloud?

• AI-Driven Insights: Leverage advanced AI to stay ahead of local trends and consumer behavior.
• Comprehensive Solutions: Cover all aspects of localized marketing, from search and social to reputation management.
• User-Friendly Interface: Simplify complex tasks, freeing up time and resources for core business operations.

To learn more about how SOCi can help you improve your local visibility and drive revenue growth, request a personalized demo today.

The future of localized marketing is here, and it starts with SOCi!